Eesti pilt Prantsuse trükimeedias

The aim of the present bachelor research consists in identifying the image of Estonia in French printed press. The author tries to follow the development of the image through the past 10 to 15 years and find its basic characteristics of today. Preceeding to the investigation of the image of Estonia, the author presents a brief overview of the social stereotypes in the intercultural communication and explains the meaning and nature of international social space. The theoretical background includes an overview of cooperation development of France and Estonia throughout the viewed time period in historical, political, cultural and economic fields. A short presentation of the French daily Le Monde gives a necessary background knowledge of the empiric material. In order to examine the image of Estonia, the main research questions were: How often and in which focus is Estonia represented in French print media ( a Baltic state, an ex-soviet country, a newly joined European Union member or one of the Nordic countries)? What are the main approaches and annotations to Estonia? The empiric material consits of three different sources: 1) French daily newspaper le Monde from the years 1996, 2001 and 2006. 2) Expert interviews with four specialists in French Estonian bilateral relations. The intreviewees were the media specialist and filmdirector Ilmar Raag, the translator Antoine Chalvin, the correspondent for Le Monde - Antoine Jacob and the previous Ambassador of Estonia in France - Andres Talvik . 3) Media reviews of Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs from the past eight years (2000 – 2007) The research methods for the analysis of these materials included content analysis and unstandardized expert interview methods. The usage of three different sources allowed to capture a more precise image of Estonia in French printed press. The study found out that the representation of estonia in French print media is scarce, but has grown in comparison to the period of 10 to 15 years ago.Estonia is first and foremost regarded as a Baltic state, followed by the image of a new European union member and then as an ex-soviet country. Estonia is not perceived as part of the Nordic countries by the print media of France. These results were compatible with the outcomes of the research papers of Kristel Vaino in 2004 (the image of estonia in Swedish newspapers) and Kerli Kuusk in 2006 (the image of Estonia in Belgium and French dailies). Similarly to these two researches the author concluded that Estonia is mostly categorized as a Baltic country and no real difference is made between all the three Baltic states. The examination of three different empirical sources showed that 10 to 15 years ago Estonia was perceived as a poor and distant ex-soviet country. By teh year 2007 the image had shifted to that of a small EU country with a rapid economic growth and IT development, where most of the problem areas are connected to the Eastern neighbour Russia.http://tartu.ester.ee/record=b2450792~S1*es